The Waymo was permitted to set the roads at the San Francisco International Airport (SFO) through a temporary permit -the first step in the alphabet company to unlock a potential useful use of use for its robotaxis.
The temporary permit, announced Monday night by San Francisco mayor Daniel Lurie, kicked on March 14th.
Waymo vehicles will not operate autonomously at the airport. Employees will push the vehicles to map the area. However, the permit indicates the beginning of a Phased Waymo approach that eventually runs commercials there.
“This mapping permit is an important step toward bringing Waymo service to millions of people traveling and from the city each year,” according to a statement from Nicole Gavel, head of business development and Strategic Waymo partnerships. “Many of those travelers have put SFO at the top of their service expansion list.”
The permit marks a twist for Waymo, which Failed to secure a permit in 2023 to map SFO. It also came with some strings attached, including data sharing, according to the language agreement viewed by the Techcrunch. This language is likely to be included in future agreements with the City and the San Francisco Airport Commission as Waymo pushes a phased approach starting with mapping, followed by autonomous testing to a human safety operator, driver -free trial, and eventually commercial operations.
The Waymo will need to provide specific data after each mapping session to each vehicle, according to the agreement viewed by the Techcrunch. The “Data Interface Agreement” requires Waymo to monitor its vehicles while admitting and exiting the airport and providing time, geography location, identity, drive -based scandal, unique driver -based listener, and a vehicle license plate number, according to the agreement.
The agreement also prohibits Waymo from the use of autonomous vehicles to move commercial goods. Waymo The self-driving program shuts in 2023And the company has since restored its efforts to shuttle people – not packages. However, language protects against future commercial delivery applications, which has raised concerns to The international brotherhood of the teams.
The restriction is sufficient to obtain the blessing of Peter Finn, Teamsters Western Region Vice President.
“We would like to thank Mayor Lurie for his leadership for joining SFO's parties and director Mike Nakornkhet for creating a template for the responsible implementation of the new technology that is considered the impact on safety, work, and community,” Finn said in a statement.
Waymo has raised efforts more than a year ago To get access to pickups and drop-offs at SFO, according to emails viewed and reported by TechCrunch at that time.
The approval process is long and requires a separate approval from the San Francisco Airport Commission. Technically, permits can be released at the decision -making of the airport, SFO spokesman Doug Yakel told Techcrunch last year.
However, it is expected to reflect the process of SFO officials passing by when Uber and Lyft first demanded access more than a decade ago. Currently, Waymo has a temporary accessing agreement to map the SFO airport lanes. Waymo will eventually need a land transport permit to work with SFO, which has not been approved.
